Inspiring Electric Car Adoption — emotive
Originally published on EV Obsession.
Getting back to the “Electrifying Transport” panel I moderated during the Renewable Cities Global Learning Forum, this next presentation comes from Eve Hou. “Eve has been an air quality and climate change planner for over a decade in Canada and the United States,” the Renewable Cities site summarizes. “She currently works for Metro Vancouver on a broad range of issues ranging from electric vehicles to home energy labelling. She holds a Master’s degree in planning and an undergraduate degree in economics, both from the University of British Columbia. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for the local chapter of the Air & Waste Management Association. Eve is a registered professional planner.”
Eve’s presentation focused on a British Columbia campaign called “emotive.” Check it out here and then my summary:
Reinforcing the focus of my introduction to the panel, Eve noted that their research found electric vehicle awareness to be very low. 47% of Canadians weren’t aware of electric vehicles… at all, not to mention specific models. Also, unsurprisingly, people buy cars based on emotions.
On the plus side, their research found that the driving experience mattered most for car buyers, and as you all should know very well by now, one of the huge benefits of electric cars is the driving experience. In fact, I’ve argued that may be the #1 thing that drives the EV revolution.
In response to a question about what EV owners loved most about their vehicles, over 50% said “the power and performance,” 30% answered “the quietness of it,” and “only 11% said the social and environmental values,” as Eve summarized.
Research also found that the most persuasive messengers about EVs and their benefits are current EV owners (i.e., not people whose paid job it is to market electric cars).
Here’s a wonderful video created for the emotive campaign.
For previous presentations from this panel, see:
Electrifying Transport (Video #1)
Electrifying Copenhagen, & Providing A Complete Transport Network
How Cities Can Advance EV Adoption — Palo Alto Example
Electrifying Canada’s Transport
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Has it not always been the best way for convincing people of something ‘new’ to have somebody who owns it convince others, share with others?
When the product is much better…
Yes totally agree, better for your wallet and much better for the environment and your own health. :))
“Monkey see, monkey do” aka the ability to learn by copying others is a central reason for the advancement of human intelligence and use of tools. Unfortunately it also means that if everyone is doing a bad thing, most people will copy it. Coming up with a better way or even recognizing a better way and doing it while everyone else is doing something different is a rare trait. All this is why it’s hard to change behavior in the first place and why, once some critical percentage have changed behavior in a particular geographic area, suddenly the new behavior is seen as a better new way of doing things and it spreads quickly. Ultimately, new behaviors only become widespread through mimicry, not through logical decisions.
This is disheartening and hard to comprehend for those of us who can imagine the terrible consequences of not transitioning to EV transportation. We’re the 11% (surprisingly high, actually) who answer that we bought an EV primarily for environmental reasons.